Illuminated Mirror Cabinet with Audio and a Demister in Matt Black

A cabinet that does more than store things: the audio version with a full door demister pad.

Bathroom lighting is the one part of a house where getting it wrong is a safety matter rather than a taste matter, and it is sold almost entirely on photographs. Every listing here states the zone the fitting may be installed in, the IP rating with both digits explained, the colour rendering index, the lumen output and the efficacy in lumens per circuit watt. If a fitting is not suitable above a bath we say so on the page you are buying it from. If a mirror is backlit and will not light your face, we say that too.

Specification

• Zone: zone 2 and outside the zones. Zone 2 is the 600mm band beyond zone 1 and the 600mm radius around a washbasin tap. It is not rated for zone 1, which means not directly over the bath
• IP rating: IP44. The first digit, 4, means protected against solid objects over 1mm. The second digit, 4, means protected against splashing water from any direction. It is the minimum for zone 2 and it is not enough for zone 1
• Dimensions: chosen above. Depth 148mm
• Light output: 1450 lumens from the front lighting at 82 lumens per circuit watt, giving 320 lux at the face from 400mm
• Colour temperature: 4000K as standard, or tunable on the model that says so
• Colour rendering: CRI 95, measured, with R9 above 60. R9 is the deep red value and it is the one that decides whether skin looks like skin. Most bathroom fittings quote a CRI in the eighties and do not quote R9 at all, which is how you end up shaving by a light that makes you look ill
• Dimming: touch dimmable from 10 to 100 per cent
• Electrical: Class 2, hard wired to a fused spur. Every socket and charging point inside the cabinet is on an isolating transformer to BS EN 61558-2-5, which is the only lawful way to have one in a bathroom
• Fire rating: not applicable to a wall or surface mounted fitting
• Standards: BS EN 60598-2-1, BS EN 1036 for the silvered glass, and BS EN 12150 for the toughened substrate. Every mirror is safety backed so it holds together if it is broken, plus BS EN 61558-2-5 for the isolating transformer, which is the standard that makes a shaver socket safe in a bathroom, plus BS EN 60598 for the luminaire where one is fitted
• Weight: approximately 33.8 kilograms
• Guarantee: five years on the fitting and the LED module, two years on the driver
• Finish: a fine texture matt black powder coat over a chromated primer, because black paint straight onto aluminium in a bathroom lifts at the edges within two years
• Audio: a glass exciter rather than a cone speaker, so there is no grille and nothing for water to enter. It is not a hi fi and we will not pretend it is, but it is a great deal better than a phone on a windowsill
• Charging: not fitted on this model
• Carcass: aluminium throughout, not MDF
• Bluetooth: pairs without an app and remembers four devices

What arrives

• the cabinet, assembled
• the French cleat and fixings
• a drilling template
• the connection block and gland
• a pairing card and instructions

Installation

A registered electrician for the spur, two people for the lift. Electrical work in a room containing a bath or a shower is notifiable under Part P of the Building Regulations in England and Wales. That means it has to be done by a registered electrician or signed off by building control. Replacing a like for like fitting on an existing circuit is not notifiable. Adding a new circuit, a new socket or a new spur is. Everything electrical inside the cabinet runs at SELV off an isolating transformer, so nothing at mains voltage is exposed behind a door that a wet hand will open.

Choosing between this and the alternatives

The features on this page are worth having in exactly one order. The demister first, because a mirror you cannot see into has failed at its only job. The charging second, because it moves the toothbrush and the razor off the basin and into a cupboard. The audio last, because it is genuinely pleasant and it is the first thing that will stop working in year eight. Buy in that order and stop where the money runs out.